Former Opposition Leader Joe Harmon is no longer a Member of Parliament. His resignation as a Member of Parliament took effect today.

Just over a week ago, Mr. Harmon wrote to the Speaker of the National Assembly informing him of his intention to resign.

On Monday, Mr. Harmon dispatched his official letter of resignation which indicated that the resignation takes effect from today.

Harmon was elected Leader of the Opposition in 2020 just after the APNU+AFC Coalition found itself in the opposition benches in the Assembly following the 2020 elections, which saw the People’s Progressive Party. being returned to office.

Mr. Harmon’s stint as Opposition Leader lasted for 17 months.

He was forced to resign as Opposition Leader following a humiliating defeat in his quest to become Leader of the People’s National Congress Reform, which is the largest party in the coalition.

At first, Harmon wanted to hold on to the position of Opposition Leader, but he walked away from the position as the PNC’s executive made it very clear that the new Leader of the party Aubrey Norton should be the one taking over the position after he becomes a Member of Parliament.

Political pundits saw Harmon’s defeat in the race for PNC leader as a referendum on his leadership of the coalition in the National Assembly and a loss of confidence in him among the party’s membership.

With Harmon’s resignation now taking effect, the Speaker will write the Representative of the coalition’s list, former President David Granger requesting that he extracts a name from the coalition’s list to replace Mr. Harmon.

Mr. Granger will have to write to the Elections Commission to extract one of the party’s candidates from its list of candidates to be made the next Member of Parliament. A similar process will follow when the resignation of Opposition MP Nicolette Henry takes effect at the end of this month.

PNC Leader Aubrey Norton will take up one of the seats being made available while the Central Committee of the PNC is to meet next week to decide on who takes up the other seat.

The National Assembly is not expected to meet again until sometime in April. When it does, once the process is completed, the two new Members of Parliament for the Opposition will be sworn in.

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Granger asks GECOM to extract names of Aubrey Norton and Volda Lawrence for Parliament Harmon resigns as Member of Parliament APNU formally informs Granger of decision for Norton to take up seat in Parliament Granger writes Speaker on Henry’s resignation from National Assembly; Process for Norton’s entry set to begin